In 2024, WestEd partnered with Sobrato Philanthropies to conduct a strategic and economic analysis of English Learner programs in the state of California. The study sought to define the scale of economic challenges and explore underlying conditions impacting the costs of implementing English Learner programs in California in alignment with best…

Purpose: Digitalisation is reshaping the learning process, shifting it towards personalisation and online learning, and fuelling the growth of massive open online courses (MOOCs) and micro-credentials. Despite being a popular global trend, limited studies have looked at micro-credentials and their impact on learners' behavioural outcomes. The…

Purpose: This study aims to investigate the attributes of the online programme that are considered and compute their relative importance in the purchase decision. This study aims to identify the most lucrative bundling of these attributes and their levels that can be used by online education companies to craft their product design strategy to…

The cost of a college degree has caused students, higher education institutions, and government representatives to investigate alternative education designs that are advertised as cheaper, more flexible, and based on skills rather than classroom seat time. Students question the rising cost of tuition, increased time to degree completion, and the…

International spouses, individuals who accompany a partner studying in a foreign country, are an important source of support for international students and scholars, yet many academic institutions overlook this population. Research indicates that many international spouses benefit from joining language programs; however, there has been no research…

Early childhood interventions can improve self-regulation, but there are few economic evaluations of such interventions. This study analyzed the cost-effectiveness of an early childhood self-regulation intervention ("Red Light Purple Light!"; RLPL), comparing three different models of implementation across stages of intervention…

State aid for special education shapes local decisions about identifying students for special education, the programs and services to which students have access and in which students with disabilities are educated, and how local educators structure and administer their special education programs. The connection between state funding for special…

The National Guard Youth ChalleNGe program is a residential, quasi-military program for youth ages 16 to 18 who are experiencing difficulty in traditional high school. The program provides classroom instruction and other structured activities to young people at 40 different sites. The focus of this report is on determining how sites can measure…

Work-integrated learning (WIL) can be expensive for tertiary students. There are potential accommodation, equipment, and travel expenses, as well as opportunity costs associated with lost income when completing unpaid WIL placements. Non-remunerative financial support such as bursaries, scholarships, stipends, and honorariums (collectively 'WIL…

Today, institutions of higher education may charge whatever they wish for the education they provide, and the government provides the capital for student's tuition through loans without institutions bearing any meaningful risk if students do not repay. Naturally, this drives up costs and borrowing. On top of tuition and fees, students can borrow…

Free college has been gaining traction as a public policy option in recent years and has been adopted in some form by at least 15 states. Enthusiasm for the idea has gained momentum with the growing realization that a healthy economy requires a well-educated workforce and that workers benefit immensely from education beyond high school. Indeed,…

This is the executive summary for the report, "The Dollars and Sense of Free College." Policymakers have debated the specifics of free-college programs--including whether free-college eligibility should extend to students at four-year public colleges as well as community colleges, and whether it should be universal or targeted to…

The purpose of this dissertation was to understand how a new two-year college was designed and implemented within the context of and as a response to the completion agenda by focusing on the decisions and actions of the Administrative Leadership Team (ALT). The research was framed around the completion agenda themes of access, affordability, and…

The recommendations put forth in this paper stemmed from a series of conversations, conducted over the course of 2019, with experts and stakeholders representing a range of perspectives and experiences within higher education and financial aid. The working group explored policy design details in depth and identified core areas of general…

This document contains the survey data and tables for the report "An Evaluation of Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act Funding for Postsecondary Institutions." In January and February 2021, National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA) collaborated with Student Affairs Administrators in Higher…